🎧 [Listen to Homily: Audio]
📺 [Watch Mass: YouTube Video]
1. She Saw Them — An
Unexpected Lesson in a Waiting Room
Recently, I
had an extended wait in a doctor’s office waiting room. And perhaps because I
had nothing else to do, I began noticing what was happening around me.
An elderly
gentleman came in by himself in a wheelchair. He needed to complete all those
forms we are expected to complete now, much of it electronically, and it became
apparent that he wasn’t going to be able to manage it on his own.
One of the
employees came over and patiently went through everything with him—every
question, every detail. She didn’t make him feel like a problem slowing down
the office.
A little
later, another elderly patient found herself unexpectedly needing another layer
of clothing because of the climate control in the office. Again, someone went
into the back and found clothing for her.
I remember
thinking: Maybe this is simply a remarkably well-run doctor’s office. Maybe
this employee was simply doing her job. But I had never seen anything quite
like it.
And then I
realized what impressed me.
She
saw them.
They weren’t
problems to be processed. They weren’t interruptions to the schedule. They were
two people who, at that moment, needed someone to take them under her wing.
And I didn’t
do any of it. I was just sitting there watching. But sometimes a stranger can
teach us something about how to receive another stranger.
2. The Stranger Who Would
Not Go Away — “Lord, Help Me”
Something
like that happens in today’s Gospel.
A stranger
appears—a Canaanite woman. She is an outsider, and to identify her as
“Canaanite” carries some history. The peoples of Canaan and the people of
Israel had known conflict and rivalry going back centuries. They had not simply
lived side by side in harmony.
And that is
hardly unique to them. Human beings have always found ways of remembering the
boundaries, grievances, and differences that separate “us” from “them.”
This woman
cries out to Jesus because her daughter is suffering. And the disciples say, in
effect: Send her away.
Whatever
their precise motives, their first response is revealing. They perceive a
disturbance. An interruption. Someone they would like to make disappear.
But this
woman will not disappear.
She calls
Jesus “Lord.” She recognizes Him as the Son of David. Jesus is silent, but she
continues. The disciples discourage her, but she continues. The encounter
becomes more difficult, but she kneels before Him and reduces her entire prayer
to three words:
“Lord,
help me.”
3. When Jesus Seems Silent —
The Faith That Keeps Trusting
And this is
where I think we have to stay with this woman for a little while.
Because some
of us know something about praying when Jesus seems silent.
We pray
about someone we love. We pray about sickness. We pray about a family
difficulty, a relationship, a decision we don’t know how to make. We ask God
for something that seems good and reasonable.
And
sometimes nothing seems to happen.
Sometimes
silence can even be harder than hearing “no.” At least “no” sounds like an
answer. Silence can leave us wondering:
Lord,
are You listening? Do You see me?
The
Canaanite woman keeps trusting.
When Jesus
speaks the difficult words about the children’s bread and the dogs, she still
does not walk away. She answers that even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall
from their master’s table.
She does not
become resentful. She does not demand that Jesus act according to her
timetable. She does not say, “If You really cared about me, You would have
answered me already.”
She
keeps trusting.
Saint John
Chrysostom saw in this encounter not Jesus expressing contempt for the woman,
but Jesus bringing into the open what was already within her: her humility, her
perseverance, her confidence and her extraordinary faith.
And finally
Jesus says:
“O
woman, great is your faith!”
The person
who begins the story as the outsider—the disturbance—is the person Jesus holds
up as an example of faith.
The stranger
becomes the teacher.
4. Faith Is Not Predicting
the Outcome — It Is Trusting the Lord
That may
also help us understand what Christian faith actually means.
Faith is not
convincing ourselves that everything is going to work out exactly the way we
want.
Sometimes
when we are going through difficulty, somebody comes along and says, “It’s going to be okay.”
And sometimes we really need to hear those words.
But I have
noticed that when I am the one who needs to say them to somebody else, they
don’t always come so easily. Maybe I don’t know that everything is going to be
okay. Maybe I don’t know what I can do to make it okay.
The
Canaanite woman does not say, “Everything is going to be okay.”
She says:
“Lord,
help me.”
Christian
hope is not a prediction that we control the outcome. Faith is trusting that Jesus remains Lord even when I do not
understand His silence, His timing, or His way.
Sometimes
our prayer therefore has to become:
Lord, I
don’t understand what You are doing. I don’t know how this is going to turn
out. But I am still here. I am still asking. And I am still trusting You.
5. A House for All Peoples —
We All Live by Mercy
And this
woman’s encounter with Jesus is part of something even larger.
Isaiah tells
us today that God intends His house to become:
“a
house of prayer for all peoples.”
The
Canaanite woman is not simply an exception whom Jesus reluctantly allows
inside. She points toward something God has been revealing all along: His plan
of salvation is larger than the boundaries human beings construct.
And Saint
Paul reminds us that none of us can approach another person from a position of
spiritual superiority. All of us stand in need of God’s mercy.
No
one enters the Kingdom by boasting about belonging. Everyone enters by mercy.
And once I
recognize that I
live by mercy—that Jesus has seen me in my need, heard my prayer, forgiven my
sins, and received me—then perhaps I begin to see the person standing in front
of me differently.
6. When We Turn Off the
Ignition — Learning to See
And that
brings us back to what happened in that doctor’s office.
Christian
charity begins with seeing.
Think about
how we drive. When we are behind the wheel, we are trained—and sometimes
legally required—to notice the vulnerable person: the child near the roadway,
the person struggling in a crosswalk, the disabled vehicle ahead.
We slow down
because somebody needs our attention.
But what
happens when we turn off the ignition and get out of the car?
Do we
continue looking for the person who needs our attention when there is no
traffic law requiring us to slow down?
The law can
require us to slow down for someone who is vulnerable.
The
Gospel asks for something deeper: a heart that has learned to notice.
And perhaps
there is a connection between these two kinds of seeing.
When I
discover that Christ sees me—even when I cannot see what He is doing—I can
begin asking Him to give me His eyes for the people around me.
That
employee in the doctor’s office noticed.
The
disciples initially saw a disturbance.
Jesus
saw faith.
And
sometimes the stranger we are tempted to overlook may be the very person God
uses to teach us something.
7. Our Prayer — Lord, Help
Me
So perhaps
we can take home today the prayer of this remarkable woman.
Three words:
“Lord,
help me.”
Lord, help
me when You seem silent.
Help me to
trust that You still see me.
Help me to
trust Your mercy when I cannot see the outcome.
And because
I have received Your mercy, give me a heart that notices.
Lord,
help me to see the person You have placed in front of me.
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